Camera Configuration

Setting Up Camera Inputs

Several inputs can be configured for each camera and the role of each input can be mixed and matched based on your needs. This allows you to use a lower resolution stream for object detection, but create recordings from a higher resolution stream, or vice versa.

A camera is enabled by default but can be temporarily disabled by using enabled: False. Existing tracked objects and recordings can still be accessed. Live streams, recording and detecting are not working. Camera specific configurations will be used.

Each role can only be assigned to one input per camera. The options for roles are as follows:

Role	Description
detect	Main feed for object detection. docs
record	Saves segments of the video feed based on configuration settings. docs
audio	Feed for audio based detection. docs

mqtt:
  host: mqtt.server.com
cameras:
  back:
    enabled: True
    ffmpeg:
      inputs:
        - path: rtsp://viewer:{FRIGATE_RTSP_PASSWORD}@10.0.10.10:554/cam/realmonitor?channel=1&subtype=2
          roles:
            - detect
        - path: rtsp://viewer:{FRIGATE_RTSP_PASSWORD}@10.0.10.10:554/live
          roles:
            - record
    detect:
      width: 1280 # <- optional, by default Frigate tries to automatically detect resolution
      height: 720 # <- optional, by default Frigate tries to automatically detect resolution

Additional cameras are simply added to the config under the cameras entry.

mqtt: ...
cameras:
  back: ...
  front: ...
  side: ...

note

If you only define one stream in your inputs and do not assign a detect role to it, Frigate will automatically assign it the detect role. Frigate will always decode a stream to support motion detection, Birdseye, the API image endpoints, and other features, even if you have disabled object detection with enabled: False in your config's detect section.

If you plan to use Frigate for recording only, it is still recommended to define a detect role for a low resolution stream to minimize resource usage from the required stream decoding.

For camera model specific settings check the camera specific infos.

Setting up camera PTZ controls

warning

Not every PTZ supports ONVIF, which is the standard protocol Frigate uses to communicate with your camera. Check the official list of ONVIF conformant products, your camera documentation, or camera manufacturer's website to ensure your PTZ supports ONVIF. Also, ensure your camera is running the latest firmware.

Add the onvif section to your camera in your configuration file:

cameras:
  back:
    ffmpeg: ...
    onvif:
      host: 10.0.10.10
      port: 8000
      user: admin
      password: password

If the ONVIF connection is successful, PTZ controls will be available in the camera's WebUI.

tip

If your ONVIF camera does not require authentication credentials, you may still need to specify an empty string for user and password, eg: user: "" and password: "".

An ONVIF-capable camera that supports relative movement within the field of view (FOV) can also be configured to automatically track moving objects and keep them in the center of the frame. For autotracking setup, see the autotracking docs.

ONVIF PTZ camera recommendations

This list of working and non-working PTZ cameras is based on user feedback.

Brand or specific camera	PTZ Controls	Autotracking	Notes
Amcrest	✅	✅	⛔️ Generally, Amcrest should work, but some older models (like the common IP2M-841) don't support autotracking
Amcrest ASH21	✅	❌	ONVIF service port: 80
Amcrest IP4M-S2112EW-AI	✅	❌	FOV relative movement not supported.
Amcrest IP5M-1190EW	✅	❌	ONVIF Port: 80. FOV relative movement not supported.
Ctronics PTZ	✅	❌
Dahua	✅	✅
Dahua DH-SD2A500HB	✅	❌
Foscam R5	✅	❌
Hanwha XNP-6550RH	✅	❌
Hikvision	✅	❌	Incomplete ONVIF support (MoveStatus won't update even on latest firmware) - reported with HWP-N4215IH-DE and DS-2DE3304W-DE, but likely others
Hikvision DS-2DE3A404IWG-E/W	✅	✅
Reolink 511WA	✅	❌	Zoom only
Reolink E1 Pro	✅	❌
Reolink E1 Zoom	✅	❌
Reolink RLC-823A 16x	✅	❌
Speco O8P32X	✅	❌
Sunba 405-D20X	✅	❌	Incomplete ONVIF support reported on original, and 4k models. All models are suspected incompatable.
Tapo	✅	❌	Many models supported, ONVIF Service Port: 2020
Uniview IPC672LR-AX4DUPK	✅	❌	Firmware says FOV relative movement is supported, but camera doesn't actually move when sending ONVIF commands
Uniview IPC6612SR-X33-VG	✅	✅	Leave calibrate_on_startup as False. A user has reported that zooming with absolute is working.
Vikylin PTZ-2804X-I2	❌	❌	Incomplete ONVIF support

Setting up camera groups

tip

It is recommended to set up camera groups using the UI.

Cameras can be grouped together and assigned a name and icon, this allows them to be reviewed and filtered together. There will always be the default group for all cameras.

camera_groups:
  front:
    cameras:
      - driveway_cam
      - garage_cam
    icon: LuCar
    order: 0